Persona 5 "Make a Note" 4:05

Tracks featuring OCR judges managed to snag first through fourth place in Dwelling of Duels' Megaten Month this past summer! The funkiest among those was unquestionably ad.mixx's lyrical spin on "When Mother Was There" with judge Chimpazilla providing Persona 5 producer power! For ad.mixx, this piece persona-lly served as an ode to his fellow musicians:

"I really loved working on this one! It was fun writing the lyrics and arrangement. Chimpazilla absolutely killed it with production, though.

I sent a purposefully stripped down arrangement to Chimpazilla and basically said "go nuts". And go nuts she did. The song wasn't too much to speak of until she did her thing. Even though I did quite a bit of the writing and arrangement, any instrumental and production/mixing work on this track can be completely credited to Chimpazilla. I knew to trust her instincts and she absolutely delivered and more.

Truthfully, this may be the last you hear of my (and Yua's) singing for a while due to personal issues, but I think this is a good note to leave things off for a while. I really enjoyed making this, and I really appreciate all the work Kristina did to bring this work to life.

As a final note, lyrically this song has many meanings. But, the main purpose of the words is to be a love letter to all musicians, including those on OC ReMix and Dwelling of Duels. I know we all have our struggles, and I know we have things that hold us back, but we do make mountains move. And we do strike hearts. Many OC ReMixes have impacted my life more than you can know. They have also saved my life more than you can know. Whether they have lyrics or not, I can feel your feelings in all of your songs. So this one goes out to you. Keep making music!"

No matter what ad.mixx is working through, we hope he navigates it with the strength and thoughtfulness he regularly displays as a creative. :-) Here's hoping his musical hiatus is only temporary, as his unique vocal style and amazing lyrics always impress me; it's been an honor to witness his artistic growth. I've already said ad.mixx is one of the scene's best songwriters, and OC ReMix is a better place for his singular contributions. Part of ad.mixx's goal in making the mountains move and shaking the earth here was once again tagging in Chimpazilla, who brought the kick and the boom as the producer! As always, Chimpa never hesitates to make a note of just how well ad.mixx set the stage for success as part of their collabs:

"Aaron gives me a lot of credit, and, yes, I did a ton of production on this track, but the concept, arrangement, lyrics, and vocal performances/processing are 100% his. Aaron is an excellent writer, singer, and arranger, and I am privileged to work with him whenever possible. I appreciate his trust in me so much.

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that ad.mixx sent me his stems for this track last January, and I worked on it right away and then got busy with other things, so this track went on the back burner for months. I finally got to a point where I had time to revisit it very recently, and then we finished it up within just a few days. I shared the track with Emunator, and he let me know that Persona 5 was on the list for July's Dwelling of Duels compo. Nice coincidence! Wes suggested we submit it. I resisted, thinking more of it needed to be live than just the vocals, but Wes urged me and Aaron to submit it, so we did. The track took fourth place, which I think is pretty good, considering the genre isn't typical DoD fare. People liked it a lot anyway! We submitted a gorgeous zebra to a horse contest, so fourth place (out of 25 entries) is not too shabby. Aaron and I are very proud of "Make a Note" and how it did in July's DoD, and I appreciate Wes for pushing us to submit it there!

Aaron is a joy to work with, he's talented and super-nice. I know he may not be doing much music in the near future, but I'm hopeful he will work through his issues and get back to making the music he loves. When that happens, I'll be right here to collab more tracks if he asks me to! Thanks again, Aaron, for your trust and friendship!"

With each musician adding their stripes to the picture, voilá, that zebra sure can gallop! :-) I love this source, by the way! The intro of it sounds like a lost Sonic CD (J) Good Future mix. :-) Judge Emunator was also part of the top four tracks in DoD's Megaten Month, and, since he was responsible for ad.mixx's debut splash there, he had to make a note of just how unique a spot ad.mixx & Chimpa's team-up occupies in our community:

"I love hearing fresh, modern pop-inspired music on OC ReMix - sometimes it feels like pop music and video game music spheres don't have much crossover, so this is a breath of fresh air to hear. Not just conceptually, but from a technical standpoint as well, this is REALLY well executed. The vocal performances and processing techniques feel right up there with modern artists (I can't hear the pitched up vocals without thinking of Porter Robinson, but this technique is happening all over the modern pop landscape) and yet is unlike anything I've ever heard in the VGM scene. You and Chimpazilla synergize beautifully whenever you collaborate, I'm glad you chose to enter this into DoD - it was a well-earned debut placement that really feels like two artists at the top of their game."

It makes sense this was part of a judge-involved clean sweep of DoDs top 4 that month; not bad for folks from a teknomanga site! ;-D ad.mixx was killing it as always with his arrangement ideas, lyrics, and vocals, while Chimpa's production, mixing, and ear candy kept this sounding incredible throughout. Everything's in its right place, relatively minimalist yet spacious and lush. (If y'all are ever interested in actually arranging Sonic CD, you'd crush that too!) Right mood, right groove, right weed, right beat -- no matter your musical persona, make a note that this one's a must-have!